Senior Prom

Senior Prom

By Ray Van Horn, Jr.

I got home well before curfew to show respect, even though I turned 18 a week ago. In a late birthday celebration, Chuck treated me to pepper and onion-loaded cheese steaks from Sal's before we took in a haul from Farpoint Comics and capped it with a handful of laps around the neighborhood in the dark. We just kinda winged the night, since that seemed the only logical course. 

It's Prom night, but neither of us went. In Chuck's case, he cares more about whether Spiderman and Mary Jane are really going to tie the knot this year. As for me, every car stuffed with silk dresses, cummerbunds and Wang Chung blaring inside pricked me like an insult.  

Everybody's had fun tonight.

Gia, the counter girl at Sal's, looked at us with such pity I could feel every ounce of it. I heard her tell the cook, Alberto, how it was "tragic" we'd been there instead of Prom. She's a sophomore at Loyola University, and it was downright aggravating listening to her gush about her Senior Prom from two years ago, how magical it had been, and how she'd lost contact with her date, Douglas someone-or-other. The word "tragic" came up again.

"Best not to even think about her, dude," Chuck had told me while we ate. "Prom would've been a colossal waste anyway." 

 "Like Amityville 3-D," I'd said, playing along, though it was a total pose. Chuck really had no interest in Prom, while I faked being above it. We both knew the truth. It was why he'd invited me to hang out tonight.

A couple days ago, I'd canceled the tux, the boutonnière and corsage. To do it had meant I'd lost. Not just once, but twice. Pop called the whole debacle a learning experience. Mom gave me a long hug and I settled for that.

Prom's just about done and I missed out. Next stop, Graduation, and I don't know where I'm going afterwards, except straight to community college. Two jobs and two girls lost in quick succession and I have no idea how it happened.

It wasn't that long ago I was working at Super Thrift.  

I was liked by management because I worked my part-time ass off, and I always completed my task lists under schedule, thus allowing me to face the shelves and rotate the dairy. Some days I was so efficient they floated me to the frozen food area so that manager could go home early. I was soon delegated a Mission Impossible workload, thus giving the assistant manager, Tom Johnson, excuse to start writing me up enough times to the point I panicked and resigned. Smells fishy, since I would've become eligible for full-time and benefits after Graduation.           

As of this past Monday, I was cleaning toilets and spraying out the ashtrays of corporate bigwigs, the money guys with the swivel chairs and the leather upholstery that groans underneath your ass when you shift your posture. With a Coke in one hand, my walkman spewing Iron Maiden's Seventh Son of a Seventh Son in the other, I used to sometimes sit in the president, Arnold Baumgartner's chair on my ten minute breaks. I'd daydream it was my office, and my half-finished, cold cup of coffee left on the desk like a power trip for the cleaning crew to dispose of. I tried to imagine what that kind of ego it takes be like that. 

Looking out through a wide-open executive window and into the reaches of night gave me a momentary sense of clarity after I suspected I was losing Ellie. The moon and stars were often brighter than the parking lot lights and the combined glow fueled me. I started writing my thoughts with the Brother electric typewriter my folks gave me for my 17th birthday. 

I want to write horror stories, but first, I gotta stop living one.

Prom's over now and everyone (except for me, Chuck and the socially inept) is either winding down or at chaperoned at-home after-parties. Last year, Benita Cruz's family had the after-party. Benita was one of Ellie's closest friends, and I was allowed to come, me being the only high school junior in a basement full of seniors. It was a rum-less Hawaiian Punch brand of tame. We'd stayed up until 3:30 in the morning and I listened to a bunch of reminiscence from people I barely knew on their way out of high school. 

This year, I'm in my bedroom, and though any time goofing around with Chuck cheers me up, I felt pathetic later reading my West Coast Avengers, Punisher, Flash and Zatanna comics. 

Even more so, smoking a cigarette here in the dark, now past midnight.    

I know better than this. I used to cringe listening to my chain-smoking father hack his guts out every morning. It was bad enough when he and Mom were still married, but the weekends I'd stay overnight with him after the divorce, I'll never forget turning on my hip to hide from it all. He sounded like he was not merely ready to puke, but like someone was twisting a pitchfork in his guts. 

Yet here I am, having pulled out a Marlboro Light from a sandwich baggie. Contraband, only it's not pot, 'ludes or acid. Cigarettes, smuggled just the same like an illicit street deal. I got them a few weeks ago from Laurie Tillery, who used to work with me at Black and Decker. She stashes bourbon in a silver flask inside the front of her jeans. She'd given me a swig to keep quiet when I saw her nipping from it. Guess she ratted her own self out, since they let her go last week. 

This week, I'm the latest statistic.

I have my window open and I'm letting the cigarette burn more than cross my lips. The few times I do pull on it, it tastes awful, like I've been licking rubber soles. I let the ashes drop into a styrofoam cup of water and now that I hear my parents buzzing at full doze, I just want to finish the stupid thing off. 

I should've had a prom date tonight, but I'd been too naive, too blindly in love, to think Ellie was going to honor her promise to come home from college and go with me. She'd been so convincing when confirming it the last time she'd been home two months ago. We even went to see Fatal Attraction, followed by Chinese at Fan's that weekend. We made out some. All before Ellie suggested we keep our options open to seeing other people.

If there's anything I'd be more ashamed of than, say, getting caught jerking off, it would be for anyone to see the way I'd bawled all over Ellie that weekend. Three hours separated, I'd stayed true to her in school. I wrote her once a week. I called her on Fridays after I got home from Black and Decker. I never thought about Ellie having interest in other guys. Not until her roommate, Alessandra, kept answering instead, taking messages that were often not returned.

I'm thinking about last summer, spent largely at the community pool or with Ellie's Baptist youth group. U2's "With Or Without You" was always playing somewhere last year. We'd gone to baseball games, fishing, the movies, rock 'n bowl, pizza parlors. As a metalhead, I wasn't the youth group's cup of tea--in particular, her ex, Duane's. He'd spared no effort to make me feel unwelcome by grousing in front of everyone how he'd lost Ellie to a grit. Worse than losing to a Catholic, he'd said, which I was--and which he knew.

I'm also thinking about that night. We'd landed here in this room, watching 21 Jumpstreet. Ellie had a crush on both Johnny Depp and Tom Cruise, and sure, I'd been a little jealous. Turned out I had no reason to be, once Ellie pulled my bed linen down and crawled underneath. I'm laughing a little, thinking how clumsy we were trying to get out of our clothes. My elbow bonked her ear. She accidentally cross-hooked my jaw shucking off her bra. 

I can see how scared she was, particularly the way her gold crucifix bounced atop her skin between her breasts from her rapid heartbeat. I asked "Are you sure?" and she nodded. We had no protection on, just the surety we loved each other and this was what people who loved each other should do.

I can hear my own gasp as I crossed the gates partway, only to be cut off by an invisible Jesus Christ asking in nerve-wracking monotone what we thought we were doing. Ellie apparently heard Him loud and clear, since all I heard was a commercial for Mountain Dew in the background.

"No, Rob, this is a sin," she told me, squeezing her legs shut with me partially inside of her. That clampdown hurt even more than the time she'd accidentally socked me in the balls during a jump scare in The Gate. She sobbed afterwards, naked and in my arms for more than an hour, telling me we'd offended God and were going to Hell. I mulled over and paralleled the first time I'd attended service at her church and jumping out of my seat in the pew when the pastor screamed at the congregation, "YOU are a bunch of sinners!" 

Pisser of pissers, Ellie had looked me right the eyes and said, "You were there for mine, Rob, and I won't forget the experience...ever.  I'll be there, I promise."

You don't know what desperation feels like until you're broke, starving and homeless...or scrambling to find a last minute prom date.

When I had to accept Ellie had dealt me an unspoken breakup, I panicked. The strongest current in high school is its grapevine, and word soon got around I was fishing like mad for a date. I saw sympathy, but mostly silent avoidance. 

I don't know what separates good luck from bad, but I can say that bad comes like a charge of cattle. Usually it goes the same for good, though we're too busy enjoying ourselves to think the good luck won't last. The bad catches us off-guard. Always.

My Creative Writing teacher, Mr. Donaldson, talks about segues and when's the right time to drop one into to your story. Here's a great spot for one, and I'd call it When Ousted by Black and Decker and Heather Clark.

On Monday, one of the ladies from the Black and Decker warehouse came into the cantina, and her chips got stuck in the vending machine. Me being who I am and the strongest guy in the room without the usual stuck snack avenger, Greg Waters, on-hand, I was looked to for help. Off-the-bat, I had some success jiggling it loose a little. Then I tilted the machine off of its front axles and let it slam back down. 

Unfortunately, my next attempt, I threw my shoulder into the machine and missed my mark. I stumbled and felt the Plexiglas window covering the machine's contents crack open with a nasty gash down the front. The sound of the break frightened me, but as the chips tumbled free, applause went up, along with a lot of laughter I didn't appreciate.

"Stupid machine's had that coming a long time!" someone said. I can't tell you who, since I was too shocked by what I'd done.

"Thank you," the lady told me after retrieving her chips, but she looked as I suddenly felt; like I was in deep shit.

A half hour later, security and our supervisor, Mr. Fell, were escorting me out the door of the complex. I felt like I'd disappointed Mr. Fell even more than I'd let Coach Barrows down by striking out to Ryan Glazer three times in a Babe Ruth league game, the last whiff coming in the ninth with bases loaded.

Earlier that night, I'd run into Heather Clark's mother, who is the receptionist for the small parts department. She was always friendly to me, since she'd known Heather and I had been close Homeroom buds throughout high school. Turned out Heather had expressed interest in dating me, as she and her longtime boyfriend, Kevin, had just split up. He'd enlisted with the Marines, and they'd had enough of a row over it to call their three-year relationship quits. I knew about the breakup, of course, but I could see Heather was so devastated, she'd been the only girl I didn't ask to Prom in my crazed search for someone.

With an endorsement from Heather's mom, I made my move. 

I watch the cigarette continue to smolder and flick the mound of ash into the cup, hearing its faint fizzle. I have The Ramones' Rocket to Russia playing on low since it's so late and my window's open, but I really want to crank "Here Today, Gone Tomorrow," no matter how late it is right now. It says everything I'm feeling.

Telling Heather during Homeroom I was basically in the same predicament as she, I'd felt overwhelming joy of the possibilities once she'd said "To heck with Kevin, let's do it."

After I'd been fired at Black and Decker, the only person I wanted to talk to after facing my parents was Heather. I'd waited for Homeroom on Tuesday morning, but Heather didn't show up for school. I thought about her all day long, and how much I wanted to share with her what had happened. Once I got home with nothing to do except a page of Algebra homework since I was now jobless, I called up Heather right away. 

There was no answer the first time, but she picked up on the second try and said she knew it was me. She'd been crying, I could tell, and I asked what was wrong. In that moment, it was my friend, Heather--not my new Prom date Heather--whom I spoke to. She'd cried in front of me once after having a fight with Kevin, but this sounded worse, as if someone had died in her family. I wanted to hold her for as long as she'd let me.

"I can't talk to you anymore, Rob," she blubbered through the phone. "I'm going to Prom with Kevin. You and I can't..."

"What? Kevin?" I can hear myself shouting, so much I'd caused my stepfather to look in on me.

"My mother says I can't see you."

"Whattya mean?" I exclaimed. 

"After what you did."

"I accidentally broke a vending machine getting chips out for someone. A stupid mistake I was fired over. I'm embarrassed, Heather."

"No," Heather said, and the fact she countered me like she was right and I wasn't took away what little heart I had left. "They said you'd thrown a security guard into the vending machine. Mom says you're violent and I can't be near you. You should've been arrested, Rob."

"That's not true!" I protested, and it sounds fresh right now, like it did earlier in the week. "Come on! You know me!"

"Please don't talk to me anymore, Rob," she said, and there is where I gave up. I wasn't going to weep on Heather like I did with Ellie. I swore to myself after Ellie I would never cry again. 

"You're not even giving me a chance!" I yelled to the echoing disconnect tone. I looked up at Pop with such disbelief he hugged me on sight.

Since Wednesday, I've been talking to Goth fanatic Angie Clayton about The Cure and Siouxsie and the Banshees, whom I'm suddenly interested in listening to. Crazy, considering Angie and I have said all but three sentences worth of dialogue to each other throughout high school until now. First year she's ever signed my yearbook, too, even dropping her number with the inviting acronym, "K.I.T." As in "keep in touch." 

Heather and Kevin reunited for one night. Angie went to Prom with Steven Bickford, the debate team captain. The jocks went with the jockettes. The legacies went with other legacies in limos or their parents' Lincolns. The academia had themselves paired off back in November. Surprisingly, the subculture mostly went--with other subculture, of course.   

I try to picture it all, the ear-splitting deejay music, since our school's too cheap to hire bands for Prom. The strobe lights, the dancing, the huddling of cliques at sequestered tables, much like any other day in high school, only cluttered with sappy Madonna and Whitney songs. The long wait in line for Prom pictures that eats up half the night. I look like I'm pissed in last year's photo with Ellie. I was actually having the time of my life with a woman I thought I was going to marry.

I start to pull the cigarette up to my mouth. My lips tighten in refusal. It doesn't want the damn cigarette, and neither to do I. As I said, I know better.

I drop it into the water cup and tell myself it's going to be like crying. I'll never do that again. I feel satisfaction, actually, listening to the cigarette drown and die, as much as I relish in the picked up breeze outside my window. I'm throwing the baggie out and sneaking the trash to the outside can, no matter how late it is.

I'm still hurting about Heather, but hell, there's little you can do when the grown-ups who provide your shelter, food and basic life expenses call the shots. 

People at school were talking on Tuesday about what I reportedly did at Black and Decker, but whatever judgment they passed upon me seems to be dismissal, if not exoneration. Kids were waving and saying hello to me on Wednesday. Whatever. In just a month, we won't see most of one another ever again. 

I can't really sleep, and I have the final assignment coming up for Mr. Donaldson's class. I've been carrying a solid A all school year and he's already told me he's looking forward to seeing what I come up with for an encore. Mr. Donaldson's made me read each of my stories aloud to the class. I used to be intimidated by it, but now I embrace being in front of everyone. If there's anything that gives me validation which Ellie, Heather or my former menial jobs cannot, it's the heavy claps, desk slaps and loud whoops I get from my peers whenever I read my work for them.

Gia may think I'm tragic, but I'm more inspired tonight than I've ever been.